Title page of our paper, “The Politics of Black Classification: Sociopolitical Cues and Racial Perception,” with Lauren Davenport (Stanford) and Hunter Rendleman (UC Berkeley), dated April 14, 2026. Abstract: What makes someone Black in American society today? From Donald Trump questioning Kamala Harris’s racial identity to Joe Biden’s claim that hesitant Black voters “ain’t Black,” American politics frequently brings questions of racial authenticity and belonging to the surface. Yet political science often approaches race as a fixed attribute rather than a social construction. Here, we seek to understand how Americans define blackness in social and political life. Using a conjoint experiment with a racially diverse sample that includes Black, white, and mixed race Black-white respondents, we evaluate how ascribed and acquired traits influence perceptions of blackness. The results show that inherited characteristics—particularly parentage and skin tone, which are the strongest determinants of racial classification—play a central role, while sociopolitical cues such as partisanship, neighborhood context, and spousal race also influence racial classification. Using a continuous measure, we also show that respondents make graded assessments of blackness rather than purely binary classifications, with some individuals perceived as more Black than others. Black respondents are more likely than white respondents to classify a broader set of profiles as Black, consistent with a more inclusive understanding of racial membership, yet they also place greater emphasis on shared political identity. These findings clarify how racial categories are socially constructed and why that construction carries real political and social consequences.

Our paper, “The Politics of Black Classification: Sociopolitical Cues and Racial Perception” (w/ Lauren Davenport & @hrendleman.bsky.social), has been conditionally accepted at Perspectives on Politics!

Sharing abstract below. Long time coming, but we are really proud of this paper.

More soon!

I think there’s little more disappointing clothing item than mediocre cashmere. It just doesn’t last. 😢

They’re going to need quite a lot of accompanying detail to make them useful.

Critical Metascience Roundup Update #3

New work and events...

🔸 Workshop on the politics and finances of open science reform

🔸 Symposium: “Who critiques the critique? Toward a reflexive metascience”

🔸 Preprint encourages establishing phenomena before testing theories

🔸 Systematic review of questionable research practices

The end of Viktor Orbán’s autocratic regime is a victory not just for Hungary, but for people who value democracy around the world. Congratulations to Tisza, to incoming leader Péter Magyar, and to Hungarians everywhere.

Yeah, true. But the ICC doesn’t see gender!

The intraclass correlation for divorce within marriage is 1.00.

And deeply thoughtful, too.

You seem nice.

📣SPSP Members📣 Check out the Action Alert from @cossa.bsky.social below to learn how you can advocate for protecting the SBE Directorate at NSF.

(More action items to come from SPSP and our partner organizations soon!)

#WhySocialScience #SaveSBE

I prefer the American Way.

It can be hard to turn your inner Elizabeth Bik off.

You can post any number of preregistrations, too.

This post is part of a longer thread and we really wanted to make sure it got attention from our community. Many thank you's to Paige Amormino (@amormino.bsky.social) for putting together this action guide to help scholars advocate for the Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences!

Anyone proposing this almost certainly has not thought through all the details and consequences.

But on the Right, it's outstanding. Right?

Thrilled to serve as a Guest Editor for the Political Ideology and Religion collection for Scientific Reports! This Collection welcomes research examining the psychological determinants of political ideology and religion. Please submit by 12/17/26 and reshare! www.nature.com/collections/...

A real rushton-to-judgment, only 14 years after he died.

This is half of the “replication crisis.” So much of the complaint and analysis imagines single-shot studies, which is hardly the foundation of science.

Umm, not really. It depends upon which tasks you give them. If you give tasks that people overestimate themselves on, they hit reality more. But if you give them tasks people tend to underestimate themselves on . . .

Hazards of English language.

It feels a little weird to share a collection of social media posts as a post on a social media platform, but we had a ton of fun making this recap with some of our favorite #SPSP2026 posts!

Check it out below and thank you again for sharing your experience with us!

wakelet.com/wake/xIGZ7RG...

Postdoctoral Fellow - Canberra / ACT, ACT, Australia Classification: Academic Level A Salary package: $89,313 - $112,103 per annum plus 17% superannuationTerm: Full time, Fixed term (up to 24 months)  The Position The Postdoctoral Fellow will work with ...

Postdoctoral Fellow in Social Psychology at the Australian National University

jobs.anu.edu.au/jobs/postdoc...

I always appreciate the trans-Atlantic corrections.

That’s seems to be true most times.

But what about planning studies where you reasonably expect a large effect? I do these sometimes—where d=.20 would be important, but I usually get d=.70. Sometimes a power analysis can be about effective use of resources.

But SESOI most times.

Your goal here is to trivialize the factual point?

That salary is what I got as faculty when I left UF! (Inflation-adjusted.)

It's livable, for sure.

I wish you had that opportunity. At the beginning, I was worried that there would be no questions, but the lines hit so long I ditched my own 5-minute talk.

I very much wanted to hear from the folk who had raised issues post 7-Oct. Didn’t happen, alas.

Could’ve used this perspective at this SPSP session “Is SPSP a Healthy Scientific Organization?”